Related papers: School reopening should be guided by solid evidenc…
The rapid spreading of SARS-CoV-2 and its dramatic consequences, are forcing policymakers to take strict measures in order to keep the population safe. At the same time, societal and economical interactions are to be safeguarded. A wide…
We investigate the effect of school closure and subsequent reopening on the transmission of COVID-19, by considering Denmark, Norway, Sweden, and German states as case studies. By comparing the growth rates in daily hospitalisations or…
Background School closures and distance learning have been extensively applied to control SARS-CoV-2 transmission. Despite evidence of viral circulation in schools, the contribution of students and of in-person schooling to the transmission…
We aim at clarifying the controversy about the effects of school openings or closures on the course of the Covid-19 pandemic. The mathematical analysis of compartmental models with subpopulations shows that the in-school contact rates…
Do school openings trigger Covid-19 diffusion when school-age vaccination is available? We investigate this question using a unique geo-referenced high frequency database on school openings, vaccinations, and Covid-19 cases from the Italian…
We develop a minimalist compartmental model to study the impact of mobility restrictions in Italy during the Covid-19 outbreak. We show that an early lockdown shifts the epidemic in time, while that beyond a critical value of the lockdown…
During Covid-19 outbreaks, school closures are employed as part of governments' non-pharmaceutical interventions around the world to reduce the number of contacts and keep the reproduction number below 1. Yet, prolonged school closures have…
Governments have implemented school closures and online learning as one of the main tools to reduce the spread of Covid-19. Despite the potential benefits in terms of reduction of cases, the educational costs of these policies may be…
Recent seroprevalence studies have tried to estimate the real number of asymptomatic cases affected by COVID-19. It is of paramount importance to understand the impact of these infections in order to prevent a second wave. This study aims…
After the introduction of drastic containment measures aimed at stopping the epidemic contagion from SARS-CoV2, many governments have adopted a strategy based on a periodic relaxation of such measures in the face of a severe economic crisis…
Situations in which no scientific consensus has been reached due to either insufficient, inconclusive or contradicting findings place strain on governments and public organizations which are forced to take action under circumstances of…
We propose a multi-layer network model for the spread of COVID-19 that accounts for interactions within the family, between schoolmates, and casual contacts in the population. We utilize the proposed model-calibrated on epidemiological and…
COVID-19 has forced quarantine measures in several countries across the world. These measures have proven to be effective in significantly reducing the prevalence of the virus. To date, no effective treatment or vaccine is available. In the…
School environments are thought to play an important role in the community spread of airborne infections (e.g., influenza) because of the high mixing rates of school children. The closure of schools has therefore been proposed as efficient…
Background. The paper concerns the SARS-CoV2 (COVID-19) pandemic that, starting from the end of February 2020, began spreading along the Italian peninsula, by first attacking small communities in north regions, and then extending to the…
Despite the progress in medical care, combined population-wide interventions (such as physical distancing, testing and contact tracing) are still crucial to manage the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic, aggravated by the emergence of new highly…
We are currently facing a highly critical case of a world-wide pandemic. The novel coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2, a.k.a. COVID-19) has proved to be extremely contagious and the original outbreak from Asia has now spread to all continents. This…
During the COVID-19 pandemic, many countries opted for strict public health measures, including closing schools. They have now started relaxing some of those restrictions. To avoid overwhelming health systems, predictions for the number of…
On 19th March, the World Health Organisation declared a pandemic. Through this global spread, many nations have witnessed exponential growth of confirmed cases brought under control by severe mass quarantine or lockdown measures. However,…
As Europe is facing the second wave of the CoViD-19 pandemic, each country should carefully review how it dealt with the first wave of outbreak. Lessons from the first experience should be useful to avoid indiscriminate closures and, above…